Richard Munton

Regulating the New Rural Spaces: the Uneven Development of Land

With the demise of agricultural productivism, that set of economic and political arrangements which made food production the overriding aim of rural policy, new forms of regulation have come into existence. These are linked to new patterns of development in rural areas which have arisen as economic actors seek to exploit the opportunities presented by the crisis in agriculture. Both development and its regulation have become localised — that is, detached from the national regime associated with productivism. This is leading to increased differentiation. We examine three land development sectors — minerals, farm building conversion and golf — to illustrate how the processes of differentiation are driven by a variety of economic, political and social actors. These are assessed using the notion of ‘arenas of representation’. Two arenas are identified — those of the market and regulation — showing how uneven development of the countryside can be understood as arising from action-in-context. Such differentiation, or the emergence of new rural spaces, is inevitable in the post-productivist era.

Deliberation and inclusion: vehicles for increasing trust in UK public governance?

Arguments in favour of participative democratic practices have been promoted stridently in recent years as trust in existing political institutions has receded. These arguments assume the declining ability of elected members to represent increasingly diverse constituencies in a period of rapid change, and a sense of powerlessness among citizens in the face of distant economic and political forces. There have been few attempts to review the available empirical evidence on whether deliberative and inclusionary processes lead to ‘better’ decisions. For the United Kingdom, evidence is limited, except in the land-use planning field, and we argue that in present circumstances their primary role should be to stimulate wider civil engagement as a means of restoring trust. ‘Better’ decisions will then follow. However, barriers to their acceptance remain, not least in the need to create sufficient incentive for citizens to participate and in the requirement that established economic and political interests devote sufficient resources for them to be effective.

The restructuring process and economic centrality in capitalist agriculture

Abstract The purpose of the paper is to examine contemporary relations in agricultural production. The discussion focuses upon the internal and external processes modifying production relations on the farm and, in particular, the changing significance of farm-based sources of income and capital (economic centrality) to the farm business in the restructuring of agricultural capital. There are a variety of reasons why farm businesses are finding it increasingly necessary to diversify their sources of income, and in some cases capital generation, which relate to their internal family relations and external contacts. While obtaining alternative sources of income for farmers may be advocated for the purpose of reducing their marginalisation and low income problems, this may only be realisable for a minority. The complexities of farm businesses and their external relations with other forms of capital suggest the need for a construction of a typology which focuses on the economic centrality of the business to the farm family. The discussion here is divided into four sections. First, the main characteristics of the restructuring process in British agriculture are identified, leading to a discussion focusing on the transformation of the family farm. The concept of economic centrality is then discussed as an important characteristic of the restructuring process affecting British farming, and a typology of farm businesses established, based upon empirical evidence collected from Londons Metropolitan Green Belt. This evidence forms part of a wider study of the changing structure of farm businesses in three areas of lowland England (East Bedfordshire, West Dorset and Londons Green Belt) which links farm business change to changes in the farm landscape.

Strategies for coping in capitalist agriculture: an examination of the responses of farm families in British agriculture

Abstract Recent attempts to identify the distinctive characteristics of family relations associated with agricultural production have tended to underestimate the dynamic processes which operate between industrial and finance capital and the farm family located at the point of production. Much of this recent research also tends to underplay the role of internal family processes in bringing about changes or assumes rational forms of behaviour aligned to macro-economic forces. This paper explores some of the relationships which exist in the 1980s between the changing political and economic environment associated with agricultural production and the individual responses and adaptations farm families are making with reference to evidence gathered from the county of Dorset, England. Adaptations in three particular areas (farm occupancy, changes in business organisation, and family labour and continuity) are explored, identifying the ways in which strategies allow for the survival of family farm businesses in an increasingly unstable market and political situation.

Regulating rural change: Property rights, economy and environment — a case study from Cumbria, U.K.

Abstract A new set of priorities increasingly determines the development of the British countryside. It is encouraging a more economically and socially differentiated countryside in which spatial patterns of development will be less predictable and environmental concerns more evident. New means of examining these complex processes of change are urgently required. In particular, they must engage with and adequately reflect the significance of local circumstances. Drawing upon Clarks notion of ‘real’ regulation, with its focus upon administrative processes, a framework is presented which re-directs our understanding of regulation as a focus for examining the relations between the market, the state and civil society. The framework is operationalized through an examination of the redefinition and redistribution of real property rights. Changes to property rights provide a means of establishing altered priorities. These priorities are reflected in the nature and outcomes of the rural land development process which, it is argued, continues to afford a particularly powerful ‘window’ on the nature of rural change. The field enquiries are based upon a detailed, case study approach using an ‘actor-in-context’ methodology. A case study drawn from Allerdale in Cumbria, England, which examines the debates and outcomes surrounding the Lostrigg open-cast coal site, is used to illustrate the methodology, to indicate the growing political substance of environmental as opposed to employment concerns in the countryside, and to demonstrate the effectiveness of local resistance to established norms of land development.

Uneven development and the restructuring process in British agriculture: a preliminary exploration

Abstract The development of a political economy approach to the understanding of agricultural development still remains in its infancy. This paper explores the significance of uneven development as a central concept with which to unify the approach. In the first part of the paper a set of scales are suggested which provide a framework for coping with uneven development in agriculture, both over space and temporally. Attempts to link theory and evidence are crucial in this process, and in the second part of the paper attention focuses upon the restructuring of British agriculture through an analysis of one such scale of uneven development, that of changes in internal production relations for the period 1970–1985.

Farm landscape change: trends in upland and lowland England.

Abstract Landscape change data for three lowland and two upland areas of the UK have been used to compare rates of change per annum in various landscape features and land uses. Data from a detailed questionnaire survey have enabled links to be drawn between changes in farm occupancy and the farmed landscape. Results have highlighted þree themes: the diversity of farm occupancy in the UK; the importance of locality and its modification of the agricultural restructuring process; and the often causal relationship between occupancy events on the farm and the propensity to ‘Intensify’ the farmed landscape through the removal of field boundaries, the ‘arablization’ of the lowlands and the Improvement of rough grazing in the uplands.

Reconsidering urban-fringe agriculture: a longitudinal analysis of capital restructuring on farms in the Metropolitan Green Belt

Changes to the pattern and structure of urban-fringe agriculture are usually explained by reference to local conditions. Attention is rarely drawn to the wider economic imperatives affecting the farming industry or how these are mediated by the particular circumstances of the urban fringe. An attempt is made to redress this emphasis through an examination of capital restructuring on farms in the Metropolitan Green Belt. Attention is drawn to the ways in which industrial and finance capital penetrate farming enterprises and to the responses of individual farm businesses to these pressures. Evidence is presented from a longitudinal survey of farm businesses located on the edge of London for the period 1970 to 1985, focusing upon the re-organization of farm business capital and new divisions of land rights.

Experimental Discursive Spaces: Policy Processes, Public Participation and the Greater London Authority

The paper seeks to engage with the interrelationships between the newly established Greater London Authority (GLA) as a form of devolved but diffuse city governance and new procedures for encouraging active public engagement in policy-making processes. The scope and conduct of new discursive spaces for engaging Londoners in the early stages of policy-making concerned with sustainable development are the focus of enquiry. The paper draws on published sources and a series of in-depth interviews conducted with officers, advisers and elected members of the GLA. Theories and practices of deliberative democracy provide the basis for assessing to what extent these experimental discursive spaces supported the pursuit of a collaborative approach to decision-making.

Dualism or diversity in family farming? Patterns of occupancy change in British agriculture

Abstract The dualist thesis of structural change in advanced capitalist agriculture, postulating the disappearance of the middle-range family farm, is examined. In the case of the U.K., aggregate statistical evidence in support of this tendency is not forthcoming whereas in the United States recent research has downplayed the trend. It is suggested that the thesis is too structuralist, paying inadequate attention to the range of responses to be found among farming households and generally directing attention to patterns rather than processes of adjustment. In order to analyse the latter, a series of detailed farm interviews, providing social and economic profiles of farm business change between 1970 and 1985, was conducted in three contrasting agricultural areas of southern England. The survey data revealed important local differences set within broadly similar trends though with a high level of unpredictability regarding individual household strategies. Areas requiring further detailed analysis are outlined.